The Universal Life Church is a unique organization. They will ordain, for free, anyone who requests it, as long as they give a lawful name and valid address.

The ULC has two tenets: the absolute right of freedom of religion and to do that, which is right. Anything else within the law is allowed.

The Universal Life Church, and specifically its Seminary, supports your relationship with your God, Gods or with your lack of belief in any higher force, and encourages all of our ministers to walk his or her own path.

A Few Words About The Founder of The Universal Life Church

Rev. Kirby Hensley, raised a Baptist, grew up in North Carolina. Though he was illiterate, he still found ways to learn about religion. As a result, he created the Universal Life Church in 1959 because he felt that everyone’s beliefs should be respected and he regularly preached his own beliefs across the country until his death in 1999. After a lengthy fight in the courts, he ultimately got ULC established as its own denomination. Lida Hensley, his second wife of 46 years, passed away in 2007 leaving Andre Hensley, his son, as the current president of the headquarters of the Universal Life Church, in Modesto, CA.

Where We Are Now

The Universal Life Church is working towards fulfilling the spiritual needs of as many different belief groups as we can, by offering a wide variety of services and information. To this end, we have many types of guest sermons, informational mailings, kind words, an expanding seminary, a complete chaplaincy program and much more.

This is a wonderful question to ask ourselves, as it shows that we are beginning to assume responsibility for co-creating the situation as it is now. Whether the person who we are in conflict with is a close friend, spouse, co-worker, or stranger on the street, we need to know that it was our actions and thoughts from past lives, and perhaps in this life, with that person which have given rise to the current problem. It is taught in Buddhist philosophy, that everything, (and this includes all our actions, thoughts and emotions) is imprinted in the Universal Mind. And the teachings of Christ point to the same wisdom: “As ye sow, so shall ye reap”.

So, even without knowing the past life events that transpired in the past to create this difficulty for us, we can assume that our actions or thoughts in the past were not of the highest response. And, we can know that in this life we have the opportunity to choose another response, one that will benefit us as a positive karmic imprint, and also plant the seed for the other person’s benefit, as well.

For example, if a co-worker is spreading incorrect and harmful information about us, what should our response be? It would be fine to “set the record straight”, so to speak, and let your boss know the truth. But, perhaps your boss and other co-workers don’t believe you and you loose your job. Our basic human response might be to have angry thoughts and emotions, resentment and possibly thoughts of some kind of revenge, directly or indirectly. But if we can step back for a moment, and look at the larger cosmic vision, we could see that somehow we created all of it, from past lives or possibly from this life. We would have to concede that our “karmic imprints” from the past are ripening as this very painful situation, and as such, we could begin to change our response from negative to positive. Many times this is very challenging! But it can be done with sincere effort, determination, and deep heartfelt prayer.

When I am beginning to turn my thinking from negative to positive towards someone, and I can’t yet feel love or forgiveness in my heart, I say or think, “May (this person) be happy and free from suffering, may she have abundance, love and wisdom in her life”. I keep saying this over and over, as I know that eventually I will feel it sincerely from my heart. I like to say, “Fake it till you make it”, which means, even if we don’t feel the positive change within ourselves, we make the aspiration to get there, and we deeply believe we will. Remember, everything is imprinted in the Cosmic Universal Mind, or God-Consciousness, and will come back to us in some way.

So this is where we can start. And if we need to be vigilant in our positive thinking toward a difficult person for the rest of our lives, as a way to override any negative thought that might appear in our minds, well, then what a beautiful way to live our lives: Aspiring toward love and forgiveness. In a sense, what else are we here for on our journey through life, other than to learn and incorporate these two powerful teachings?

In particular, I remember one of my past life reading sessions with a woman who was in an angry relationship with her ex-husband. She wanted to know the past life causes for their difficult relationship. In brief, I saw them married, and he came to hate her and wanted her to die. So he slowly added poison to her food everyday, and she did eventually die. In that past life, she never knew before she died that he was poisoning her. After she died, her spirit was able to know that he did it, and so she held anger towards him.

After relating this information to her, she told me something that somewhat shocked me. She said that she had bought some poison the day before and had planned the next day to poison a large number of trees he had just planted on his property. I tried to caution her on the future implications of her actions, but from what I could tell, she couldn’t hear me. But with the barest amount of wisdom in our minds, we should ask ourselves in a case like this, “Do we really think that performing a harmful action or thought toward someone we are angry with, won’t in some way come back to us?”

Even the causes in that past life that made her husband poison her had to be the fruit of her actions from another previous life. Obviously, these two people were doing a negative karmic dance with each other throughout lifetimes. In the end, to stop this ongoing harm, one of them will have to make the choice to lay down his or her weapon of anger, or else the negative energy will continue to ripen again and be the cause of future pain and suffering.

As the Dalai Lama has said, “We don’t need our friends, we need our enemies”. The reason for this wisdom-teaching is that it is our enemies that give us the powerful opportunity to grow in love. He further states, “When you meet an enemy on the path, treat them like a sacred treasure”.

And the teachings of Jesus point to the same wisdom: “Love thy neighbor as thyself”.

So the question begs of itself, “Why not start this very moment with the intention of sending forth love and forgiveness toward our enemies?” If we want both a life and a world of peace, generosity and love, we have to know that it begins with ourselves. However small any action or thought that we choose to have, be it positive or negative, has an effect on our own well-being, as well as effecting the collective universal energy.

How can we transform difficult relationships with people from past lives?

This is a wonderful question to ask ourselves, as it shows that we are beginning to assume responsibility for co-creating the situation as it is now. Whether the person who we are in conflict with is a close friend, spouse, co-worker, or stranger on the street, we need to know that it was our actions and thoughts from past lives, and perhaps in this life, with that person which have given rise to the current problem. It is taught in Buddhist philosophy, that everything, (and this includes all our actions, thoughts and emotions) is imprinted in the Universal Mind. And the teachings of Christ point to the same wisdom: “As ye sow, so shall ye reap”.

So, even without knowing the past life events that transpired in the past to create this difficulty for us, we can assume that our actions or thoughts in the past were not of the highest response. And, we can know that in this life we have the opportunity to choose another response, one that will benefit us as a positive karmic imprint, and also plant the seed for the other person’s benefit, as well.

For example, if a co-worker is spreading incorrect and harmful information about us, what should our response be? It would be fine to “set the record straight”, so to speak, and let your boss know the truth. But, perhaps your boss and other co-workers don’t believe you and you loose your job. Our basic human response might be to have angry thoughts and emotions, resentment and possibly thoughts of some kind of revenge, directly or indirectly. But if we can step back for a moment, and look at the larger cosmic vision, we could see that somehow we created all of it, from past lives or possibly from this life. We would have to concede that our “karmic imprints” from the past are ripening as this very painful situation, and as such, we could begin to change our response from negative to positive. Many times this is very challenging! But it can be done with sincere effort, determination, and deep heartfelt prayer.

When I am beginning to turn my thinking from negative to positive towards someone, and I can’t yet feel love or forgiveness in my heart, I say or think, “May (this person) be happy and free from suffering, may she have abundance, love and wisdom in her life”. I keep saying this over and over, as I know that eventually I will feel it sincerely from my heart. I like to say, “Fake it till you make it”, which means, even if we don’t feel the positive change within ourselves, we make the aspiration to get there, and we deeply believe we will. Remember, everything is imprinted in the Cosmic Universal Mind, or God-Consciousness, and will come back to us in some way.

So this is where we can start. And if we need to be vigilant in our positive thinking toward a difficult person for the rest of our lives, as a way to override any negative thought that might appear in our minds, well, then what a beautiful way to live our lives: Aspiring toward love and forgiveness. In a sense, what else are we here for on our journey through life, other than to learn and incorporate these two powerful teachings?

In particular, I remember one of my past life reading sessions with a woman who was in an angry relationship with her ex-husband. She wanted to know the past life causes for their difficult relationship. In brief, I saw them married, and he came to hate her and wanted her to die. So he slowly added poison to her food everyday, and she did eventually die. In that past life, she never knew before she died that he was poisoning her. After she died, her spirit was able to know that he did it, and so she held anger towards him.

After relating this information to her, she told me something that somewhat shocked me. She said that she had bought some poison the day before and had planned the next day to poison a large number of trees he had just planted on his property. I tried to caution her on the future implications of her actions, but from what I could tell, she couldn’t hear me. But with the barest amount of wisdom in our minds, we should ask ourselves in a case like this, “Do we really think that performing a harmful action or thought toward someone we are angry with, won’t in some way come back to us?”

Even the causes in that past life that made her husband poison her had to be the fruit of her actions from another previous life. Obviously, these two people were doing a negative karmic dance with each other throughout lifetimes. In the end, to stop this ongoing harm, one of them will have to make the choice to lay down his or her weapon of anger, or else the negative energy will continue to ripen again and be the cause of future pain and suffering.

As the Dalai Lama has said, “We don’t need our friends, we need our enemies”. The reason for this wisdom-teaching is that it is our enemies that give us the powerful opportunity to grow in love. He further states, “When you meet an enemy on the path, treat them like a sacred treasure”.

And the teachings of Jesus point to the same wisdom: “Love thy neighbor as thyself”.

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So the question begs of itself, “Why not start this very moment with the intention of sending forth love and forgiveness toward our enemies?” If we want both a life and a world of peace, generosity and love, we have to know that it begins with ourselves. However small any action or thought that we choose to have, be it positive or negative, has an effect on our own well-being, as well as effecting the collective universal energy.

Throughout the history of our society, one group or another has been fighting for their rights to be equal. Whether it’s a race issue, when they tried for the ‘separate but equal’ idea, or it’s an issue of certain groups having to wear a giant yellow star on their clothing – the fight for equality has been ongoing.

One of the leading warriors in the fight for equality is the Universal Life Church. For starters, the ULC will ordain anyone for free and for life, without any question as to your personal beliefs, race, orientation, etc. There are some churches that won’t ordain women, for instance. Some feel that only men are worthy to become ordained ministers.

Others will kick out anyone who they find out is not heterosexual or who doesn’t conform to that particular church’s belief system and practices. For true equality to happen, people need to be allowed to find their own answers and to have the freedom to express and explore those beliefs.

Many churches feel they are equal, but they are in fact exclusive and cater only to those who readily conform. The Universe is full of answers for people of all faiths and belief systems. The major religions all have at least some kernels of universal truth. Some have more than others and some have fewer. Truth, however, has a unique ring for each person and a church offering true equality will encourage individual’s search for their own truth and light.

Becoming ordained gives everyone the same place to start. Once ordained, you are free to follow your heart, mind, and spirit to find your soul’s fulfillment. You may find it in a study of the teachings of Jesus Christ or perhaps one of the many Pagan paths is more to your liking. The beautiful thing is that you can find equality without the sameness that is found through more traditional churches. Forging your own path, listening to the whisper of your own soul, and sharing your personal truth with absolute freedom is the cornerstone of what a good church is all about. Dare to be different!

How many times have you said that life wasn’t fair? From your perspective, at one time or another, you’ve probably thought it unfair that some people had so much, and some people had so little. Or that an innocent child dies when a convict lives on. Life just seems unfair.

From a minute-by-minute, small-picture basis, you’d be absolutely right to think that. When one looks at the bigger picture, however, you might come up with a different answer. The Universe, regardless of how strange and mysterious it may seem, is always in perfect balance. Or, I should say, it is always in a perfect state of creating imbalance for the sole purpose of finding it again in new ways.

One of the many ways that people search for balance in their lives is through a search for their own personal spiritual growth and answers. Many find it through traditional churches, like Christian Churches or Pagan groups. There are, of course, also groups for Buddhists, Jews, Shamans and pretty much any other religious or spiritual groups you can think of. One place where people can find all of those answers in one place is through the Universal Life Church. The ULC Seminary supports an ever-increasing number of belief systems through their online courses.

It used to be that people had very clear-cut beliefs, which made following them and adhering to them very easy. Within the various churches, there was a very clear-cut hierarchy with rules and people to tell you what to think, and how to think it. In some ways, this made life very simple. On the other hand, it also left a lot of people feel unfulfilled. They followed the rules set out before them, but still felt empty inside.

Looking for answers within is a much scarier process, but ultimately more fulfilling. When looking for your own answers, you can see where your life is out of balance and seek to rectify the situation by looking within. You can more easily find the lessons you need to learn and are more likely to be able to see where things may ‘seem’ unfair, but are in fact, just the Universe balancing itself out.